This is a two part essay, the first about my morning, and the second about my last hour shopping at a local grocery store. I have the hubris to ask the reader to stay with me, as this story will reflect on a recent book, one that while popular had a profound effect on me personally, that is connected to my day's events. The book, by Barbara Ehrenreich, is entitled, "Bright-Sided" a play on the term "blind sided," but telling the story of how the Self Help, Positive Thinking movement, far from a fringe activity indulged in by those who can't afford psychotherapy, is so insidiously pervasive that it has affected institutions in ways I had no inkling of.
Many on Dailykos, beyond our political similar persuasion, pride ourselves on critical thinking, of using the various skills that we have mastered, usually by formal education, to understand our world. While there is an element of group think here, more often those essays that attract attention challenge us, our comments eliciting further thought, more precise explication and analysis by the writer and readers. Most of us are not devotees of popular gurus who promise happiness if only we eschew negativity.
Barbara's (I feel we are on a first name basis) book so reflected my own feelings about the triviality and falsity of so much of our society that it was a joy to read. She writes about widespread magical thinking, although expressed in differing styles of sophistication, that affirms that to be rich one only has to imagine this happening; with the corollary that continued poverty has nothing to do with the world around us, but a failure of positive thinking. How this explains the phenomenon of political identification by those on the edge of financial survival with the ultra wealthy almost jumps off of the page.
Those Mega Churches that have sprouted across the land, their messages spread to millions of television broadcasts are only loosely connected to the message of Jesus Christ, being almost exclusively a barrage of happy talk, that God wants you to be rich, if only you follow the message, not that of the Bible, but that of the entrepreneur on the pulpit.
What affected me most personally was something that I had hardly been aware of, that my field of study, social Psychology, one that I had mastered to the point of getting an ABD (M.Phil) from Columbia University many years ago, that although I never worked in professionally still informed my world view, had been transformed, in a way not unlike the mega churches. This was best reflected in the title of a book by the person who became the President of the American Psychological Association, Martin Seligman, and by doing so, used the profession's centuries old reputation for rigorous scientific methodology to personally become a Self Help huckster, and to bring the academic discipline down with him. The name of his book that represented this apostasy is, like that of my essay, "Authentic Happiness" In Seligman's usage a state available to anyone who follows his prescription, in the ancient tradition of such nostrum purveyors.
I have not read his book, yet his first sentence sets the tone, "For the last half century psychology has been consumed with a single topic only-mental illness-and has done fairly well with it." One can only use such a counter-factual (clinical psychology which deals with mental illness is less than 15% of the academic profession) if he is to go on to contrast his work as an antithesis to this purported distorted focus. But it doesn't matter what I think, or what Barbara Ehrenreich thinks, the damage is done. The rigor of value free science, that stern discipline that focuses not on a goal, but on understanding all aspects of the subject, in this case human emotion, behavior and interaction has been subordinated to selling the efficacy of his prescription for happiness; and while there is some resistance in the profession, the power of this new thinking is too pervasive to combat, especially since academic psychology, the prime source for such resistance has now been corrupted.
Oh, I was depressed by other things too. Much more mundane, like my neighbor once again putting up his American Flag to wave in my vision day in and day out, even though he can't even see it, and the flag should not fly at night, but he doesn't care and thinks it's patriotic, and I'm enough of an outsider as it is. I couldn't shake the many things that were getting to me this morning, and as I was making a right turn into our library, after playing some tennis, I heard on the our local Public radio a report of research on a new index of well-being to replace the GNP as a way to see if life was getting better. This was exactly what I was talking about with a friend in discussing this book only yesterday, so I was listening intently. too intently, as while I made my right turn I failed to notice that although I was making a legal turn on a red light, those who were making a left had a left turn arrow so had priority and were also turning. Heading right toward a car, I hesitated a split second and then slammed on the brakes....in time. But now I was shaken, as I am concerned that as I'm getting older my ability to concentrate is diminishing. This time it was close, but what if......
Driving very carefully, after returning the books, I drove to my local specialty grocery store, It's a Trader Joes, if anyone is interested.
And this gets us to the second part of this essay.
As I parked my car, feeling as depressed as I've ever felt, I walked into the store. They sell all their produce by the piece, and I bought two bananas, just enough until I can get more at Costco. And then I walked to the sample counter, and got a tiny cup of meat ravioli, right after a small child had taken a little fruit drink and said to the man behind the counter, "thank you." There were some workers straightening up the nut selection and I we chatted a few seconds about how the pending strike of the chain store Grocery employees being settled, that labor and management came to the realization that it would only hurt both sides, and how this was good not only for the two sides but for the customers.
I went to get my bottle of scotch, the cheap kind, since after my first drink it doesn't matter; but I was out, and I don't like to use my 18 year old stuff just for me. And as I was at the liquor shelf, a women a few years older than I approached me with a bit of a smile and asked, "Do you know anything about the medicinal value of Vodka?" I thought for a second, and realized that she was asking this question in earnest. So I expounded, "All alcohol in small amounts, a shot or two of the hard stuff or a glass of wine is shown to be good for you, preventing heart attacks and things like that." She said that she had heard as a child that brandy, whiskey or Vodka had specific medicinal effects, and that's what she was wondering about. I said I didn't know about that, but suspected it may be more informal custom or like that. She smiled and thanked me.
Then another brief conversation when a women showed me the container of grated ricotta cheese that said zero cholesterol and asked me if this could be right. I pointed it out that the portion was only for teaspoon full, and if she had more it might have some cholesterol. She jokingly said, "Please, don't destroy my illusions.
My spirits were lifting, so much that I was about to ask one of the workers, they're called "team members" if I could get a job there. I had put a few more things in my cart-- a six pack of beer, a couple bottles of wine, a nut mix, and some spicy tomato juice. The express line had only a few people, so I whimsically asked the person in front wither my six pack would be counted as one item to keep me under the twelve item limit, and she suggested it would. There was an older guy, (when you are 71 older means like ten years older than you are) in front of me, and an adorable small child, maybe a three year old girl who was sitting in the grocery cart facing us. I asked him if she was hers. She had been following my conversation, and she quickly pointed to the women in front, her grandmother's age, and indicated no, she belonged to her. She didn't want there to be any confusion as to whom she was with.
As I swiped my credit card, I verified with the checkout person who was in late pregnancy whether I had followed the rules and the six pack counted as one item. She said, "sure, especially if I could have a shot of that Scotch about now, I would let it pass. " As I walked out of the store, the old man was right ahead of me, slowly walking hand and hand with his wife, who was a bit shaky as old people get as the years take their toll.
The time in the grocery store was one of simple pleasures. The many strangers had magically been transformed into friends. And as I walked to the car, what was welling up inside me without any thinking at all, that I describe here with no purpose other than to share my story, can only be described, at least for that moment, as "Authentic Happiness." -something too rare, to fragile, too real, to be turned into a commodity by anyone who is trying to make a buck.